Walked into a diner in Nashville and saw a chef prepping 80lbs of onions by hand

Honestly, I was just grabbing coffee between shifts last Tuesday at this old-school spot near 12 South. The head chef was standing at the prep table with a big knife and like 5 bags of yellow onions, no machine in sight. I asked him why he wasn't using a food processor, and he said "blades make them cry differently, you lose the texture." He timed himself at 12 minutes for the whole batch of 80lbs one behind another without stopping. Has anyone else noticed a real difference in your final dish when you cut by hand versus using a machine?

2 comments

2 Comments

benc533d ago

Yeah, I've seen similar stuff. That number seems off by a lot.

terrybennett4d ago

Wait, 80 pounds in 12 minutes? That's like 7 pounds a minute, almost 4 onions per minute. I gotta call that out respectfully, that math seems way off. Even a pro chef can't peel, trim, and dice that many onions that fast without losing fingers. Maybe he meant 8 pounds? Or 12 minutes just for the dicing part after they were already peeled? I'd believe him if he said 12 minutes for the dicing, but not the whole job start to finish with 80 pounds.